


Bound in Iron

by Lorekeeper-Of-The-Nine (AtomicCherryBomb)



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies), jotunn - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Norse Religion & Lore, Altruism, Angst, Blood and Injury, Castles, Darkness, F/M, Fae & Fairies, Gothic, Historical Fantasy, Implied/Referenced Torture, Jotunn Loki (Marvel), Kindness, Loki Angst, Loki Silvertongue, Loki and Thor Are Not Related, Magic, Miðgarðr | Midgard, Pain, Psychological Trauma, Reader-Insert, Seidr, Superstition, Trickster Loki (Marvel)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-09
Updated: 2018-12-14
Packaged: 2019-09-15 04:34:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,642
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16926591
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AtomicCherryBomb/pseuds/Lorekeeper-Of-The-Nine
Summary: You weren’t supposed to go into the lower floors of the castle; the servants had warned you against it, telling you tales of dangerous prisoners and spirits that haunted the cold hallways beneath the castle. Unfortunately your curiosity overpowered the dread their warnings filled you with and you found yourself creeping down the steps one night regardless, eager to see what lay in the unexplored basement.





	1. Into the Dark

Even the thick hide of your slippers couldn’t keep the chill from your bones as you crept silently through the dark tunnels that lined the underbelly of the keep. Your woolen frock was tugged tight around your narrow shoulders, your armor against the chill and the mysteries of the deep and in your hand you clutched a small candle. It’s light flickered over the rough stone in the dank, damp corridors, casting taunting images over every surface. 

The servants had warned you vehemently against venturing down here; their faces ashen as they whispered of noises and spirits that haunted the dark. If only they knew how much more that fed the fire in your belly, encouraging you to explore. You had never shied from the unexplained- running into the forest as a child to search for fairy circles and leaving offerings of milk and honey in your window. Perhaps it was an old wives tale, but your gran had insisted that it was the only way to keep you safe. She used to tell you that it was better to earn the favor of the spirits than to anger them with your disrespect.

You had clung to her tales, whispered before the blazing hearth and feeding your imagination as they encouraged you to protect yourself from the magic world that hid just outside the door. She insisted that your father's old keep was right in the midst of some of the most dangerous parts of the moors, where the veil between realms was thinnest. It left you eager to find what beings may be prowling around the territory, even though your father staunchly discouraged such things. 

At first he had dismissed your Gran’s stories as nothing more than fairy tales, things that a young woman of breeding should not concern herself with. Lately he had simply opted to warn you that if there was truth to the tales you would find yourself unprotected and at the mercy of the other being if you kept seeking to chase them. After that you had been fairly content to stay within the confines of your room, making silent offerings to the creatures you couldn’t see and going about your day of chores and studying while your family sought to find you a suitor. When it had been revealed earlier that day that they had chosen- a boorish old fool with some official title given by the Queen, it had broken your resolve. He would be there within the fortnight to collect his bride. 

If you were to be taken far away by a cruel, lecherous old man, you may as well explore the one bit of the caste that had shied from for years. For the past few months the servants had been whispering about it more than usual, saying there was something dangerous down there. Malevolent and cold, chilling the stone around it. So it was that you crept through the dark now, wondering what had them so startled, with an iron cross clutched in your grip. 

As you peered down one passage, curious where it led you thought you heard something in the distance. A gentle stirring of something heavy and metal upon the ground. It sent a jolt of excitement and fear through you and you steeled yourself against the unbidden feelings. When nothing further moved you took a deep breath, reminding yourself that you were safe so long as you held fast to the cross at your chest. 

You forced your feet forward one after the other, deeper into the passage as you cast your candle from side to side, looking at what seemed to be old cells on either side of you. The old iron bars smelled of rust and filth and you shuddered involuntarily at the thought of the prisoners that had perhaps once been locked away down here. Towards the end of the tunnel your candle slid over something that should not have been there and you froze. 

Surely you had imagined it- you had to have. These chambers hadn’t been used in years. A treacherous part of your mind pointed out that you had not passed a single cobweb within the passage and that seemed to indicate that they had been used recently after all. You turned, looking at the cell once more. 

On the floor, to the left of you, was a body. Emaciated and weak and covered with a threadbare, far too thin blanket. You could see the contours of rigid bone and muscle beneath the fabric, beginning to show signs of wasting away. A shock of matted black hair was visible beneath one side of the blanket, long and unkempt. Your breath caught and your hand trembled, mind racing to make sense of this as the body stirred. The movements were wrong somehow, pained and stiff in a way that didn’t seem quite right. Almost as if the person was in pain. 

Of course they were in pain, you reminded yourself. If this wasn’t a trick of your imagination, this person had been down here for who knows how long, with nothing but a blanket to protect them from the harsh fall chill.

You felt riveted to your place as the creature pushed itself up into a sitting position, a movement heralded by the rattle of heavy chains. You moved your candle closer, trying desperately to get a better look, curiosity and fear sending your heart into a frenzy in your chest. He was bound, two heavy iron cuffs with chains attached on his wrists and similar on his ankles. They left the thin skin beneath red and inflamed, looking almost as though they were burned. Another heavy iron chain seemed to hang from his neck to his wrists, but you couldn’t quite make it out in the dark as he shielded his eyes a bit from the flame. 

His skin was so pale it was almost blue- you nearly dropped your candle as his blanket slid down a bit, revealing that it was no trick of the light. This creature was peering up at you warily with eyes of the brightest crimson and his skin was blue. Not just blue, but lined with some sort of markings, perhaps scars? They peaked out on his face and over his emaciated form as he regarded you, red eyes having a hard time focusing on your form. 

A startled gasp echoed through the wall and you realized with a flicker of shame that it was you hat had uttered it. You caught sight of the creatures mouth and felt a wave of nausea roll through you as you realized that it had been sewn shut. Jagged, hasty stitches of what looked like wire protruded grotesquely through the skin around it's thin lips, leaving gnarled, torn flesh in it's wake. Without thought you hurried to the edge of the bars, holding the candle light but clinging to the iron as if it was the only thing holding you up. The cross had been discarded beside you as you took in the sight before you. You felt a great wave of hurt and pity for this thing before you. 

He was blinking at you slowly, cautious and perhaps confused at your intrusion. His throat had a heavy iron collar on it and was raw to the muscle beneath it. For a moment you considered this might be a dream, and if it was not, you certainly should not be within your father dungeons gazing at such a demon. Though this did not look like any demon you had heard of. 

A shaking sob escaped your lips as another wave of nausea rolled over you. You felt a great swell of emotion choking you, driving you to do something for this pitiful thing. The form shifted a bit, turning to sit and look at you, wary and perhaps a bit curious at the strange woman crouching in the filth of the dungeon. He looked so very tired and pained and it send an ache through your heart. If this was a dream, certainly you could help this creature? Should you? What if it wasn’t a dream and you father found out? 

There was a slow clanking as this creature stood, wobbling dangerously on it’s feet before catching itself. It rose to its full high and you let another frightened little gasp as he towered over you. You stood quickly, still holding to the bars for support as your gaze remained glued to his in shock. Suddenly he was closing the distance between you with an inhuman swiftness, reaching with clawed blue hands towards you and you stumbled back, falling against the distant wall as the chains that bound him to the stone wall behind stopped his advance. 

The creature let out a strangled, muffled cry and for a moment you could swear you smelled the rot and burn of flesh. It fell to the ground, glaring furiously at you as you slowly backed towards the door, terrified. With one final glance at its prone form you turned, finally giving in to the impulse to run far away from this thing. Your feet pounded roughly against the ground, carrying you far from here and up the stairs, back up to your room and far from the horror in the basement. 

Perhaps when you woke up tomorrow it would all have been a dream. A horrible, terrifying dream brought on by your Gran’s stories. Even as you changed and stowed your filthy slippers and shift away where they couldn’t be found, you felt the certainty in your heart. You knew this wasn’t a dream. Your Gran had never spoken of blue beings with red eyes and scars on their skin. What remained hidden in your father dungeon? 

Thoughts of those eyes kept you up that night, shaking beneath the covers of your bed and staring at your offering of cream and honey to the Fae on the window. It seemed so silly now, offerings to delicate fairies and magic being when there were demons about. When you finally fell asleep those eyes were waiting for you, glaring and full of hatred you had never seen before. Challenging you.


	2. Chapter 2

You awoke the next morning feeling well rested despite the rapidly fading memory of nightmares and terror. With a long, languid stretch beneath your covers you emerged, delighting in the bite of the chill on you skin for a moment before you began your day. Very little seemed out of place and it was not until you were tucking away the bowls on your window that you remembered the night before. 

A small noise escaped you as you looked down to your boots, tucked beneath boudoir and still caked in drying muck from the basement. Memories of crimson eyes and blue skin flooded your memory and you reached to steady yourself against the frame of the door. A sinking feeling settled into the pit of your stomach as you realized with dismay that you had left the iron cross from the family altar in your hurry to flee. 

There is no way that father would not notice it missing, you would have to retrieve it. Perhaps it was a trick of your mind, thinking that the man in the basement had looked like a demon. Certainly that must be the case. It would be safe to go down there again and fetch the cross, but you would have to move quickly. The house was already up and father would be emerging from his study soon. 

You swallowed the lump of fear in your throat and slipped on the shoes from the night before taking a candle in hand. The stride of your steps this morning was far more hesitant than it had been the night before and it seemed as if you feet were made of lead. It took considerable effort to force yourself into the shadows once more. A few feet from the stairs that lead beneath the keep you paused, catching sight of a small pitcher of drinking water in the kitchen. 

In your entire life, you did not think you could ever forget the look of his worn body and cracked lips. He seemed as if he hadn’t been fed or received water in quite some time and it struck you as particularly cruel. Granted his lips had been sewn shut, or perhaps you had imagined that too? Whatever this man had done, he certainly did not deserve the inhumanity of being denied the most basic of human needs. 

With a resolute nod of your head you walked into the kitchens, pleased to see that the servants paid you no mind as you grabbed the pitcher and darted around the corner towards the stairs. A look behind you assured you were not being watched and you descended back into the inky darkness quickly, the flicker of your candle lighting the way as you crept along the corridor. The presences of the sun above did nothing to make the dank, oppressive air of the corridor feel more welcoming as your feet carried you further from the lingering light of the stairs.

The little tendrils of dread started to creep into your mind almost immediately, growing in strength with each step. Your mind started to imagine voices and whispers in the silent dark, screams of agony and cruel laughter curling into the night. You shook it off, steeling yourself against the treacherous reaches of your own imagination. The steady pace of your steps faltered as you turned down the hall that held the cells and you felt a rush of discomfort as you realized that this corridor felt considerably colder than the one you had just walked down. 

Your heart began to thunder within your breast and you forced your chin up, determined to face the nightmares with all the grace a woman in your standing. It did not take long to reach the final cell and you find the man sitting there against the stone behind him. His head was down and you let out a frightened exhale, breath curling up in steam in the cold of the room. How strange, it hadn’t been quite so frigid in the other hallway. 

The sound of metal brought you out of your own thoughts and you felt that shudder of terror throughout your body as his red eyes met yours. It had not been a nightmare after all, unless you were still within it. His eyes looked far more focused today, shrewd and intelligent and watching you with interest. They raked over your body curiously, taking in the modest embroidered gown that you had gathered above the dirt below.

You set the candle aside on a ledge nearby, reaching to pick up the cross and set it in place beside your light before turning back to the prisoner. He had raised his head fully, leaning his arms to rest on his knees as he regarded you. For a long moment you simply looked at one another, your eyes finding the freshly dried blood on his wrists as he shifted to get more comfortable. His lunge the night before had clearly harmed him. 

In all your time you had never heard of a prisoner being bound so, let alone to have their mouth sealed shut. What could your father possibly want with this poor creature that he would keep him alive and yet deny him food and water? It chilled your heart to think of your warm father being capable of such abject cruelty. 

“Hello,” you spoke evenly in a voice just above a whisper, earning a tilt of the blue man's head. There was something in his eyes that almost seemed amused by your speech. Nevertheless you persisted, determined not to allow this demon to cause you to falter again. “I am Y/N,” you offered, the pervasive silence in response unnerved you and you held the pitcher up. 

The red eyes in the dark slid to the vessel in your hand, narrowing curiously before returning to your face. “I brought you water. Are you- would you like water?”

Silence met your question for a long stretch before the thing in the back of the cell nodded it’s head. The nervous flutter in your chest settled a bit at that and you glanced around the area, trying to discern the best way to get the water within his reach. His chains had not allowed him to get too close to the front of the cell and there was no sign of keys to allow you to get closer to him even if you had the desire to. 

You saw a movement out of the corner of your eye and turned back to the man, noticing his attention on something in the cell beside him. With a raise of your candle you noticed that the other cell was not closed or locked and instead hung open. The thought of entering a cell yourself struck terror into your heart, but one more look to the blue creature hardened your resolve. Demon or not, the creatures from beyond the veil did not deserve such treatment. 

The candle was set down once more, flickering over the area as you raised your skirts into your hand carefully. You stepped gingerly into the cell, moving towards the bars that lined the enclosure that the prisoner was in. The sound of metal shifting once more echoed in the hall as he moved to his feet, slowly approaching as you did. He hovered a ways away, not quite at the end of his tethers but seemingly wary of startling away the person offering him some sort of reprieve. 

You reached through the bars, pleased that the small pitcher you brought proved just small enough to fit through them with careful maneuvering. Reaching as far as you were able, you set the pitcher on the ground, withdrawing quickly and rising back up, still clutching at your skirts as you watched. 

He wavered for a moment, looking between you and the pitcher before moving towards it on unsteady legs. Dirt and blood caked hands reached for the small vessel, pulling it to him and inspecting it curiously. The demon seemed to sniff at it, before tilting its head back, lifting it above him. 

The dim light the unsteady flame afforded left you just able to make out the way that his lips tried to part, pulling roughly at the ragged wounds that wired his mouth shut. With a great effort they seemed to finally separate, the skin straining and tearing for the effort but the creature did not seem to be phased by it. With great care he poured the clear liquid over his mouth in a trickle, desperate to not spill a single drop. 

You were transfixed, watching as the slender throat of the prisoner stretched beneath his collar, gulping frantically at the liquid. What water did not pour down his throat ran over his front, washing the fresh blood from his torn flesh down his neck in murky rivlets. It looked unimaginably painful and you could not bring yourself to turn away from it. A silent witness to the suffering of this broken looking monster in the depths of the keep. 

When the last of the water had made its way past his lips he let out a soft groan of pleasure, mouth closing again. He returned his attention to you, eyes glittering in the dark with a bit more life than they seemed to have minute before. A long minute passed as he considered the pitcher before carefully stepped closer to you. 

A noise of distress escaped you as he pressed towards the bars, carefully maneuvering the pitcher through the narrow gap in them and holding it out to you. Your eyes darted between him and the vessel in his hands uncertainty, afraid to grow closer to this towering form. Cautiously you stepped forward, one hand grasping the edge of it and gently lifting it from his possession. 

Those crimson eyes bored into your own for a long moment, seeming to search for something in you. Finally he stepped away, withdrawing his hand and pacing back to the wall, curling back down to sit again. 

The silver of the pitcher felt cool against your skin, you realized suddenly. Almost like ice. Was it him that caused the temperature change? What magic was this that could chill metal to feel as though it were frozen? 

“Are you-” you began suddenly, flushing as you realized that you had not intended to speak aloud. “Have they fed you?”

There was a sound in the dark as the creature shook his head. You frowned, mind turning over this information restlessly. If you were found sneaking down here your father would beat you- and likely would punish this man- if he could be called that- as well. 

“I will return after sundown with something,” you told him before you had even truly made up your mind. He stretched in response, his muscles rippling beneath the thin fabric of the filthy tunic he was wearing. It was like observing a great horse shaking the dust of the dary from it’s coat and you were transfixed. He gave a small incline of his head, almost as if a thank you, or perhaps a dismissal. 

Before you lost your nerve you grabbed your candle and the cross beside it, hurrying out of the dank, oppressive dungeon and up into the welcoming light of the mid morning bustle in the keep. You were able to return the cross to its place on the altar and the pitcher to the kitchens without any notice and hurried to the library. Perhaps somewhere in the books there was something that might explain the blue skinned man that was bound in your basement.


End file.
